I'm passionate about what I do for a living and I'm learning and developing new skills all the time. This page is an attempt to show where I'm at right now.

Overview

At my current workplace (Dulay Seymour) I'm responsible for all web output and as such I'm required to have a fairly broad skill set. My current role covers everything from pitching, tendering, requirements gathering, interaction design, information architecture and wire-framing through to accessibility, usability, graphics and Flash work as well as front and back-end coding.

Web Standards & Progressive Enhancement

I'm a firm believer in web standards and always aim to incorporate features as progressive enhancements which degrade gracefully around an accessible semantic core.

Usability and Accessibility

I studied Interaction Design as part of my Computer Science Masters and although studying usability theory from an academic perspective first sparked my interest, what fascinates me now is how these principles can be applied on a practical level within the diverse technology space and design space that makes up the modern web. In my current role I'm responsible for making practical suggestions on the usability and accessibility issues of the sites we develop, both during pre-production and through the design and build phases. I communicate these within our design team as well as with clients where appropriate.

Incorporating accessibility features into the sites I develop is a natural part of my workflow and I aim to make all sites as accessible to as wide a range of devices and users as possible. Typically this means always meeting Level A and often meeting Level AA or Level AAA success criteria of the WCAG 2.0 Working Draft.

Pre-Production & Project Management

As well as developing sites I also deal with the pre-production and project management of the websites I develop.

I always try to avoid considering technologies too much during early pre-production. Concentrating instead on determining business objectives and target markets while gathering requirements and site assets. By ignoring the technology you tend to be less limited by it. That said, as technology has moved on, being aware of current techniques can sometimes add possibilites and creative opportunities that could be missed otherwise.

Typically the members of a project team will have a range of different backgrounds, levels of understanding and experience. Communicating problems and solutions effectively within a diverse project group like this is often key to the success of a project. Methods I use to help achieve this are card sorting, wireframing and lo-fi prototypes.

For sitemap and wireframe development I always start with pencil and paper and use card sorting for establishing site structures. For making them client-ready I've used Visio on the PC in the past but I now I tend to use Omnigraffle on the Mac.

In terms of general office apps, I'm very familiar with MS Office but recently dropped it for a combination of Open Office, Thunderbird and Google Calendar. So far this has worked well.

Graphics and Flash

I mainly use Fireworks, Photoshop and Illustrator for my graphics work. I usually work from designs created in Photoshop but I tend to use Fireworks for exporting and image optimisation to make use of its excellent compression capabilities.

Where I need to design some page elements I tend to use Fireworks - opening Photoshop only if I need to do some 'heavy lifting'.

I'm not a hardcore Flash coder but I know my way around it. I know ActionScript (2.0 currently) and I've used it to develop hybrid Flash-XHTML websites, banners, dynamic photo-galleries and even the odd fully Flash site where appropriate.

XHTML/CSS/DOM and Other Abbreviations

I typically work in XHTML 1.0 Strict, positioned and styled with CSS (1, 2 and implemented parts of 3) and behavior added with unobtrusive ECMA DOM JavaScript. I use AJAX where beneficial and for data-sharing I use XML and JSON.

I code XHTML/CSS by hand but I'm also familiar with Adobe Dreamweaver and typically use it in code view to speed up my workflow.

Back End Development

When required to get my hands dirty on the server side I use PHP and MySQL hosted on Apache servers. I've rolled a number of bespoke dynamic solutions this way, including Property Management Systems and Mailing List Managers. For sites that require more complex dynamic functionality I've recently adopted the Open Source CMS Drupal as a base framework which I have learnt to extend and theme as required.

I also have SQL experience gained while with pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline.

Platforms and Browsers

The studio I'm currently based at is a Mac house but I use both a PC and a Mac within my role. At home I've traditionally been a PC user but I recently made the switch to Mac.

Firefox is my development browser of choice, though I also test frequently in IE6, IE7, Opera and Safari (Mac & Win).

BSc/MSc

I've learnt more about the 'hands on' aspects of web design from being in the field but York University has an excellent reputation for Computer Science and my Masters gave me a solid foundation in software design principles and user-led HCI/Interaction Design for web-based, mobile and other interactive devices.

For my Masters Project and Thesis I studied wiki and wiki-based collaboration which gave me a lot of insight into the social factors involved in web-based interactions and usability. More detail on this project and a link to the final report can be found here: Wiki Collaboration - Masters Project & Thesis.

Meanwhile, in my former life as a Medical Microbiologist (before I found my calling) I gained a grounding in analysis and problem solving that I'm now putting to good use in my web development work.

You've Read This Far, Now What?...

If you're not sick of me banging on about myself, you could contact me. I seem to be most popular for wiki-related questions, but I do my best to reply to emails on any topic.

Alternatively, if you'd like less information you could request a copy of my CV or for further information on my work interests and recent projects you could take a look at the recent work section.